


Don't You Go (Before I Do)

by hollyandvice (hiasobi_writes)



Series: The Ballad of a Dove [8]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-05
Updated: 2016-08-05
Packaged: 2018-07-29 10:57:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,806
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7681714
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hiasobi_writes/pseuds/hollyandvice
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>There's a scant few seconds where everything's fine. Where they fly in formation and Voltron comes together the way it hasn't in two years. Where Voltron holds and the unity is strong in Keith's veins. Where that cohesion resonates through the bond with Lance and through the team's surface level mind meld, binding them all together the way they haven't been in too long. For those few seconds, Keith thinks everything's going to be okay.</i>
</p><p><i>Then Shiro sucks in a sharp breath, and, in the time it takes Keith to register that something's gone wrong, alarms start blaring, Voltron starts collapsing, and a sheer, soul deep </i>fear<i> resonates down his bond with Lance, one that's gone as quick as it had come.</i></p><p>The team tries to get back to business. Things don't quite go as well as they'd hoped.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Don't You Go (Before I Do)

**Author's Note:**

> A huge thank you to [Tina](http://idoltina.tumblr.com/) for the beta despite this not being her fandom. You are an angel and I love you so much! Thank you too to [Luna](http://wildunknownmen.tumblr.com/) for the Spanish help; it really let me tap into what I wanted to do with this installment. You really saved me here, and I appreciate it so, so much!!
> 
> Most of the Spanish has [hovertext translations](http://teekettle.tumblr.com/post/126920988304/live-example-my-ao3-skins-while-ao3-has-a), and what doesn't has footnotes at the end. Luna speaks Mexican Spanish, and as I know there are all sorts of nuances to the language, if I have anyone that is willing and ablt to help me tweak (as necessary) to be true to Lance's Cuban heritage, [please come let me know!!](http://hollyandvice.tumblr.com/ask) I also threw in some Brazilian Jiu Jitsu links for one of the fight scenes because I ended up using some BJJ terminology while writing and I thought I'd just throw in some explanatory links rather than rewrite it.
> 
> [Reblog from here!](http://hollyandvice.tumblr.com/post/148479182868/fic-dont-you-go-before-i-do) Fic title from [Better Dig Two by The Band Perry](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIdCo_QAz_E), series title from [If I Die Young by The Band Perry](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7NJqUN9TClM).

Keith blinks his eyes open, not sure when exactly he fell asleep. Lance is sitting up in bed beside him, looking around Keith's room as though cataloguing the changes. There haven't been many, but Keith knows the place doesn't look the same as it did before…. Well. Before. Lance is rubbing idly at his leg, and Keith considers reaching out to take his hand. He refrains, simply watching instead.

Lance finally notices Keith's eyes on him and turns to face him, a small smile on his face. Warmth and comfort bloom in the center of Keith's chest where the bond lies, and Keith revels in it. This is the man he's been missing. This is the man he lost. This is Lance. He reaches out, fingers ghosting over Lance's cheek, and Lance leans into them, a cautious sort of hope on his face. "Morning," Keith whispers, hardly daring to break the silence.

Lance smiles, a gentle hum resonating through the bond. Keith bites his lip, fighting the temptation to pressure Lance into speaking. For all that he can feel Lance on the other end of the bond, he's also aware of the sharp edges the bond has now--edges it didn’t have with Child, places that Lance won't let him touch. It's strange, and it leaves Keith feeling a little off-center, but it's hard to begrudge Lance some measure of privacy, knowing what little Keith does about what was done to him while he was a Galra prisoner. He's known for a while now that whatever still exists between them isn't going to be enough to erase the damage the Galra did to Lance, and while Keith isn't happy about that, he does understand it to some extent.

The rings feel heavy against his sternum, a reminder of what he and Lance once were, but Keith knows this isn't the time.

Keith leans in, letting the quiet yearning in his chest echo down the bond, but Lance stiffens slightly, and Keith knows a rejection when he feels one. He changes course, pressing a quick kiss to Lance's cheek, before he draws back. "You ready to go see the team?"

Lance blinks, looking a little taken aback. But he recovers quickly, grinning and nodding. Keith slips out of bed, rummaging in the drawer that he'd never quite been able to divest of Lance's clothes. He pulls out the first set of clothes he can find and chucks them at Lance before grabbing his own outfit for the day. He turns to face Lance as he slips his shirt over his head, a question on his lips, but he forgets the words when his eyes land on Lance, who's staring at the clothes in his lap with something like disbelief.

"Lance?" Keith asks.

Lance blinks up at him, something unreadable in his eyes. Keith reaches through the bond tentatively, and he feels the same sheer confusion tinged with awe Lance is feeling, and though it takes him a moment, he traces the feeling to its source.

"Oh," he says, trying to find the words to answer Lance's confusion. "I…." He swallows, at a loss for words. "I, uh. I didn't want to… I couldn't…." He swallows again, lets go of his pride, and meets Lance's eyes head on. "It would have made losing you real. I couldn't handle that."

Lance blinks a few times, the confusion slowly clearing. In the end, he smiles a little, gets out of bed, and crosses the room to Keith's side, leaning in to press a kiss to his cheek. When he steps past Keith and out into the hall, presumably to change clothes in his own room, Keith feels a twinge of irritation. He's seen Lance naked before, why the hell--

Then Keith remembers the way Lance was rubbing at his leg, the way Child never let Keith see him in short sleeves, the cautious way Shiro had kept Keith away from his training sessions with Child. He remembers the months of pain that Lance had been subjected to--the ones he's only experienced in part, and only through the bond.

This may be Lance instead of Child, but that doesn't mean he isn't a changed man, or that his body isn't littered with the evidence of that change.

Keith clenches his hands and only just manages to keep himself from bruising his knuckles trying to put them through the wall. It's been months since he gave into a fit of rage, and he won't let himself fall prey to one when he's already gotten so much back.

Grabbing his jacket before he slips out into the hall, he catches sight of Lance in fresh clothes with one foot out the door of his room, staring at something down the hall. Keith follows his gaze and feels a smile settle on his features when he sees what Lance is looking at.

"You should go give him a hug," Keith says, startling Lance out of his reverie and nodding at where Hunk is walking down the hall away from them.

Lance chances a glance at Keith before breaking out in a grin and sprinting down the hall, all but tackling Hunk as he embraces him. Hunk stumbles a little, glancing over his shoulder to look down at Lance. "Um. Hi?" he says, sounding a little confused.

Keith saunters a little more lazily down the hall, reveling in the warmth blossoming in his chest from Lance's side of the bond. Hunk looks up at Keith, confusion in his eyes. As he looks at Keith, though, something seems to click, and his eyes go wide.

"Oh, quiznak," he breathes out, realization setting in as he looks down at Lance. " _Lance_?"

Lance looks up, grinning, and Hunk laughs, sounding relieved and a little desperate at the same time. He turns around and reaches out, lifting Lance off his feet in a huge, sweeping hug, and the contentment and relief echoing down the bond knock a breathless laugh from Keith's chest. Lance is still grinning, but also still silent, and Keith can feel his restraint through the bond as well. Lance is waiting for something. Keith just doesn't know what.

Hunk hardly seems to notice, settling Lance back down on his feet and smiling at him. "We gotta get you up to breakfast--everybody's gonna want to see you."

Lance throws a conspiratorial look over his shoulder at Keith as Hunk grabs his hand and starts dragging him upstairs. Keith just shove his hands in his pockets and follows at a much more sedate pace, grinning when he hears the explosion of noise from the kitchen when Hunk comes bursting in shouting that Lance is back. By the time Keith makes it into the room, the whole team is dogpiled around Lance, Pidge and Shiro joining Hunk in hugging him tightly while Coran and Allura hover, trying to hide their joy. The second Shiro loosens his hold on Lance, Coran darts in, gushing about how much he'd missed him and stealing a hug as well. As Keith makes his way fully into the room, Shiro meets Keith’s eyes, raising an eyebrow. Keith shrugs in answer to the unspoken question: _I'm not okay, but I'm close enough_. Shiro nods before turning back to Lance, who's grinning at all of them, looking even more like himself than he had last night.

The look settles the nerves in Keith's stomach somewhat, at least until Pidge catches on that Lance still isn't talking. They turn to frown at Keith, arms still wrapped around Lance's shoulders. "Are you sure this is Lance? He's not running his mouth," they joke, glancing hopefully up at Lance.

Lance and Keith both wince.

Shiro takes over the moment without missing a beat. "Let's give him time, Pidge. This whole thing has to be pretty overwhelming."

Pidge just hums, something knowing in their eyes. Still, they draw back, punching Lance's shoulder affectionately. "Well, it's still good to have you back, man," they say, grinning.

Lance manages a shaky smile and a nod before Hunk hauls him over to the table, shoving him unceremoniously into a seat. "Gimme a sec, dude, I'll whip up your favorite."

Hunk's about five minutes into his cooking frenzy when Zheerun and Karala make their way into the kitchen looking as effortlessly comfortable as ever. Keith is a second too late in realizing the problem they present.

Lance is already on his feet, halfway across the room as he backpedals away from the two Galra women, and through the bond, Keith can feel the way the panic is rising up to choke him. Keith's across the room as fast as his legs can get him there, but the second he tries to reach out for Lance, Lance jerks away, his eyes a mix of confusion, betrayal, and fear.

"It's okay," Keith soothes, hearing the way his own voice shakes. "They helped us. They helped _you_. They're not going to hurt you."

Lance glances between Keith, the other paladins, and the two Galra, and Keith knows he screwed up not warning Lance about them. He'd just gotten so used to the comfortable way that Child moved around them that he hadn't thought to let Lance know about their presence on the ship.

Keith hears Shiro move to usher them out of the room, but Keith shakes his head sharply, not taking his eyes off Lance. "No, don't." He can feel something in Lance _shift_ as he approaches his bondmate, and to his utter surprise, he feels Child's presence brush up against the bond. Lance relaxes minutely, his gaze clearly turned inward as he listens to whatever Child is communicating to him. Slowly, he looks back up, his eyes on Keith for confirmation. "What did he tell you?" Keith asks, voice soft in the space between them.

 _Safe,_ Lance offers through the bond. _He told me they're safe._.

Keith nods. "They are. They've been in the castle with us for weeks, and they've helped us identify and take out a few crucial targets. They're safe, Lance. I promise."

Lance nods back slowly, straightening from the hunched position he'd taken up in the corner. He's still eyeing Zheerun and Karala with a certain measure of uncertainty, but he seems to be taking Keith and Child's words at face value.

Karala’s face twists for a moment before her features land somewhere between relief and heartbreak. She looks up at Keith, the latter taking over in her eyes. "You recovered your lover from his mind, then?"

"I did," Keith asserts, uncertain whether he is being praised or condemned.

Karala nods. "I see." She takes a seat at the kitchen table, her eyes focused on Lance. Zheerun settles down beside her, and Keith is sure she's wound their fingers together beneath the table if the affectionate way Karala looks at her is any indication.

Lance tilts his head to the side again, and Keith can feel Child brushing up against the bond again. Lance blinks, looking startled, and he turns to look at Keith. _They're… like us?_

 _Yeah,_ Keith answers down the bond, sensing that Lance wants to keep this private. _They bonded the same day you and I did._

Lance blinks again, turning to face Karala again with something tired and wistful in his eyes. _Huh._

\----

No one mentions it all morning, but Pidge brings it up at lunch, looking reluctant to do so. "Look," they say, sounding nervous, "I hate to be the one to bring it up, but. Is Lance up for training? Are we going to--"

"Don't," Keith bites out, anger curling in his stomach. "Don't you _dare_ say the word Voltron today. Today of all days. Don't you--"

Lance reaches out, one hand coming to rest on Keith's knee under the table. Keith stops short, glancing at Lance before turning away, angry and irritated at Lance's patience. _I'm not blind, Keith, and I'm not stupid. I know why you all came for me. I know what it must have cost you all to go this long without being able to form Voltron. I know what needs to be done._

Keith clenches his hands into fists in his lap, squeezing his eyes shut. _Don't ask this, Lance. Don't ask me to put you back in danger when I've just gotten you back._

Lance huffs, turning in his seat to face Keith. _Like I'm going to let you fly off into the eye of the storm without backup? Hell no. Let me be a part of the team again, Keith. Let me try._

Keith bites his lip and takes a shuddery breath before slowly opening his eyes. _When?_

_As soon as we can._

Keith nods. "Alright," Keith says, voice shaking. "Alright. I'm not happy about this, but…." He looks up, meeting Pidge's eyes. "He says it's fine. He says we can start today."

\----

After Allura has set the castle down on a nearby habitable planet, the team heads down to the hangar to board their lions and do a test run at forming Voltron again. Lance is positively reverent as he leads the way down, and when they get there he wastes no time in rushing over to Blue's side and brushing his fingers over her snout when she leans down, nosing at him. When Blue realizes who it is, she throws her head back and roars, the other four lions answering the call. Keith can feel Lance's smile from all the way across the hangar, and he can't fight down the tiny grin of his own that he buries in Red's leg.

It's good to have Lance back.

Lance takes a few minutes to reacquaint himself with Blue's controls. In the meantime, Allura comes down with the new version of paladin armor that she'd spent the last two years perfecting, and when Lance jumps down from Blue's mouth, she holds it out to him. He blinks at the suit, reaching shaky fingers out to it, only to snatch them back, shaking his head. Allura takes the suit back, and though the rest of the team does Lance the courtesy of not looking at him, Keith catches sight of the way his fingers rub at his artificial leg. Keith's heart aches, and from the way Lance's head snaps up and their eyes meet across the hangar, Keith knows he didn't shield that feeling from the bond as well as he probably could have.

Lance looks away first, and Keith tries not to let that feel like a loss.

As the team boards their lions, Keith has to fight down his worry about Lance and his state of mind. Lance presses back down the bond, and that gentle touch of reassurance at the corner of his mind is apparently all it takes to calm Keith down. He smiles again, not needing to hide it in the safety of Red's cockpit.

The team exits the hangar, heading out onto the surface of the planet. Keith can feel the moment they all sync up, the moment Shiro debates telling them all exactly what they need to do, and the moment Pidge's silent eyeroll convinces him to shove it.

"Alright, Team," Shiro calls. "Let's go!" 

There's a scant few seconds where everything's fine. Where they fly in formation and Voltron comes together the way it hasn't in two years. Where Voltron holds and the unity is strong in Keith's veins. Where that cohesion resonates through the bond with Lance and through the team's surface level mind meld, binding them all together the way they haven't been in too long. For those few seconds, Keith thinks everything's going to be okay.

Then Shiro sucks in a sharp breath, and, in the time it takes Keith to register that something's gone wrong, alarms start blaring, Voltron starts collapsing, and a sheer, soul deep _fear_ resonates down his bond with Lance, one that's gone as quick as it had come. Keith has just enough time catch his breath and brace himself before Red is being flung away from the body of Voltron, sending him crashing to the ground. He fights to right his lion, and he has a split second view of the way Blue and Black are still locked together before they're flung apart with a vicious sort of violence that turns Keith's stomach.

He hears Shiro's shout of pain from the impact, but feels nothing from Lance's side of the bond. The sudden lack of feeling sends him straight into fight or flight, and he hauls Red the rest of the way upright through force of will alone, driving her harder than he ever as before to get to Lance. He makes it most of the way to Blue's impact site before he feels Lance force a whisper of _Fine, I'm fine,_ down the bond before locking Keith out again.

Keith pulls Red up just short of Blue, vibrating in his skin with the need to go down and check on Lance. He holds himself back, though, knowing that Lance needs time to recenter himself before being faced with Keith's fears.

Eventually Lance hauls Blue upright again, and Keith feels himself relax minutely. Hunk and Yellow join him at Blue's side, and Keith is grateful when Hunk has the presence of mind to ask before jumping down to check on Lance. "Is he okay?" Hunk calls over comms.

"More or less," Keith asserts, and Hunk breathes out a sigh of relief.

"What happened?" Pidge asks from where they're checking on Shiro and Black. "It seemed like things were going fine at first, and then everything happened so fast I can't tell what went wrong."

"I don't know either," Hunk says, sounding equally confused. "Should we try again, or--"

"No," Shiro says, sounding a little pained but otherwise none the worse for wear. "No. We're not trying that again in our lions until Lance and I get ourselves under control."

Keith feels Lance's indignance down the bond, but Lance doesn't say anything, and he quickly reels in his irritation. Keith blinks, but Hunk asks the question that's on all their minds before he can open his mouth. "What are you talking about, Shiro?"

Shiro sighs, sending a crackle of static through the comms. "I'm talking about the fact that Lance and I have too much fear between the two of us. We're not going to be able to pilot Voltron like this." Shiro grunts, presumably as he rights Black, and Keith can tell he's about to drop a bomb. "We need to practice connecting our minds again."

Keith can feel Lance straining with the urge to shout that he's not afraid, that he doesn't need to train, that he's strong enough already, but something's still holding him back from speaking. Keith doesn't poke at the edges of the bond; instead he approaches Blue and lets Red nose at her. Lance huffs, getting his lion to her feet. Keith feels Lance's irritated acquiescence down the bond and can't stop a soft laugh at the feeling. "Got it, Shiro. Why don't we take five and then meet up in the training deck. I'm going to go tell Coran we need the headsets. Hunk, can you make sure Lance makes it back to the castle in one piece?"

"Uh." Hunk sounds a little startled, and Keith can feel a similar note of surprise down the bond. "Sure?"

Keith forces a grin onto his face. "Thanks." Then he takes off in Red, like he can outrun the fear he felt from Lance and, to a lesser extent, from Shiro. The way it had shaken him to his core… he'd known Lance and Shiro were strong, but he doesn't think he really knew _how_ strong, and he wishes they'd never had to _be_ that strong. That kind of pain…. No one should have to experience it, and Keith doesn't think he has the strength to face it again should Lance ever let it spill over through the bond again. Keith may want to be strong for Lance, but he knows his limits.

He never wants to feel those things again.

\----

It takes less than twenty minutes on the training deck for it to become abundantly clear that this isn't working. Lance hasn't been able to get his projection to stay stable, and Shiro hasn't even been able to form his projection, neither of which seems to bode well for the team.

Keith's the one that brings it up, hesitant, but hopeful. "Could it be… I mean, is it possible that having the three of us here is getting in the way of you two really connecting and figuring out what it is that's making hard to sync up? Because we could let you two try on your own for a while if it would help."

Shiro blinks, looking thoughtful, but Keith doesn't have time to analyze the look in his eyes beyond that, because the second the words are out of his mouth, a searing shot of pure betrayal echoes down the bond. Keith sucks in a sharp breath and sways a little where he sits at the sheer strength of emotion Lance is projecting. He pitches forward, catching himself on one hand as the other flies to his chest, trying to suck in a breath in his suddenly constricting lungs. He loses time for a brief moment, his vision clouding up as he struggles to breathe, and he only just catches the sound of Shiro snapping "That's enough, Lance!" before the pain dissipates as quickly as it had come and leaves Keith staring up at Lance, who's gotten to his feet and is glaring down at him with the coldest eyes Keith has ever seen in that face. It leaves Keith gasping for breath again not from Lance's pain, but from his own. But even as he feels his control slipping and his pain echoing down the bond, Lance's ire doesn't abate. After a long moment of the two of them staring at each other, Lance rips off his headset, flings it at Keith, turns on his heel, and storms off the training deck.

Keith hates the fact that it isn't until Lance is off the training deck that he feels like he can breathe again.

Still, he looks over at Hunk, bites his lip, and says softly, "Do you mind?"

It seems to take Hunk a moment to understand what Keith's asking, but when he does, he looks concerned. "You sure, Keith?"

"Yeah, Hunk," Keith says, trying to ignore how ashamed the admission makes him feel. "I'm sure."

Hunk removes his headset and gets to his feet, throwing a worried look over his shoulder at Keith before slipping off the training deck after Lance.

Keith goes on rubbing at his chest, the ache there feeling more like a pulled muscle than anything else. He can feel Shiro and Pidge watching him, but he doesn't really have the strength to say anything to either of them.

Finally, though, Shiro breaks the silence, and Keith can't hide anymore. "What happened?"

Keith closes his eyes. "Lance… he was angry. Betrayed. I couldn't tell exactly why, but if I had to hazard a guess--"

"He didn't want to open his mind to me again," Shiro says, sounding grim. Keith looks up at him, meeting his eyes and nodding once. Shiro sighs, rubbing a hand over his face. "I'm sorry, Keith. I should have warned you after what happened in the Lions."

Keith sits up a little straighter at that, and he feels Pidge tune in, too. "What _did_ happen?" Pidge asks eagerly.

Shiro's face darkens, and suddenly Keith isn't sure he wants to hear the answer. "Lance and I… the things we've seen and experienced aren't exactly things that either of us really want to share with the team. I've always kept those things pretty close to the chest when we're forming Voltron. Lance did the same thing, but…. Well, I think Black saw an opportunity for me to actually have someone that understood, and…." Shiro shudders. "God. It's one thing to think about those things when you're expecting it. It's another altogether to be faced with them without any warning." Shiro shakes his head, as though shaking off the memory. "Lance panicked, of course, and I… I did too, I guess."

"But your lions actually managed to stay connected," PIdge says, sounding confused.

Shiro nods. "That was mostly my fault. Blue could tell Lance was in distress and tried to disengage, but I… I didn't want to let him go. I let the rest of you go, but I didn't want to let Lance suffer alone." Keith clenches his fists and carefully doesn't point out that he and Lance are as far from alone as it's possible to be. "In the end, it wasn't enough, and… well, you both saw what happened."

Pidge nods thoughtfully, but Keith has to grit his teeth to keep from saying what he wants to. Despite his restraint, though, Shiro, as always, notices that Keith isn't okay. "Something on your mind, Keith?"

Keith bites his lip, trying to find a tactful way to say what he wants to. Then again, tact has never been his strong suit. "If you knew he was resistant, why did you suggest the headsets?"

Shiro pales and looks away, but Keith can see his leader hesitating the way he so rarely does. "I guess I was hoping that it was just the fact that neither of us was expecting it that kept us from connecting," he says, voice soft and guilty. "I was hoping that if he was expecting it then things would be easier."

Keith may not be bonded to Shiro the way he is to Lance, but he can tell how hard it is for Shiro to admit to this, and his anger softens instantly. He reaches out, placing a hand on Shiro's knee. Shiro offers him a weak smile that Keith returns. "He'll come around," Keith assures Shiro. Shiro nods, but he doesn't look like he believes it.

To be honest, Keith isn't sure he believes it either.

\----

After giving Lance a solid hour to cool down, Keith heads to the kitchen to try to talk to him. He finds Hunk there, but no sign of Lance.

"Hunk?" he asks tentatively. "Where's Lance?"

Hunk winces. "Not sure. He came in here and stewed for about twenty minutes, but then he stormed out and I haven't seen him since."

Keith sucks in a sharp breath. "Oh. You're sure you don't…." He shakes his head. "Thanks, Hunk."

He's halfway to Zheerun and Karala's quarters before it occurs to him that that's where _Child_ would go for comfort, not Lance. Lance would go to the central mapping room. Even now, years later, Lance would undoubtedly want to take comfort in images of home. Keith makes a sharp about face, heading up to the mapping room, relieved that he's figured out where Lance is.

When he opens the door to the mapping room, the space is dark and damning. Keith steps into the room to activate the lights, but that only serves to leave no doubt that Lance isn't in here.

Keith's heart sinks. He supposes on some level it makes sense. Lance is experiencing a different sort of pain, a loss and powerlessness distinct from the homesick helplessness he'd felt before being taken by the Galra. A different sort of pain calls for a different sort of comfort. The question is, what sort of comfort does Lance need right now?

Keith runs a frustrated hand through his hair, the motion coming in time with a sharp twist of anger in his chest. Briefly thrown, Keith takes stock of what he's feeling for a moment before realizing the anger isn't his own. It's Lance's. And it's coming from downstairs.

Keith takes off down the hall, following the tug in his chest down and down and down and into the training deck. Keith slaps his hand on the control panel and the door slides open to reveal Lance locked in hand-to-hand combat with the Gladiator. Keith relaxes against the doorframe, a small measure of relief flooding him at knowing Lance is still in the castle.

Lance glances over toward him, seeming momentarily distracted, and in that split second the Gladiator strikes, taking Lance down. Lance collapses with a grunt, and Keith jumps into the fray, parrying the Gladiator's strikes while Lance catches his breath. Irritation slices through the bond, and then Lance is shoving Keith out of the way, forcing the Gladiator to the edge of the room with a series of quick, precise strikes. Then he ducks under an outstretched arm, takes the Gladiator's back, and, with a deft flick of the wrist, powers the machine down.

Keith approaches Lance slowly, unsure what he's done to earn Lance's ire. "Lance? You okay, man?"

Lance throws a glare over his shoulder, punching a sequence into the Gladiator's mainframe and jumping down, walking away from Keith and taking a stance in the center of the training deck. The Gladiator takes a second to boot up, but then it's coming at Lance hard enough and fast enough that Keith's amazed Lance can keep up in his still-weakened state. Lance still isn’t back to fighting form after so long with the Galra, but despite that, he seems to be holding his own. Keith finds himself staring at the pants Lance is wearing, wondering why he hasn't opted for shorts like he normally would. Then he reprimands himself silently. _The leg. He's still ashamed of his leg._

Lance lands a resounding punch on the Gladiator, one that doesn't quite send the machine flying, though it's a very near thing. He glares over his shoulder at Keith for a split second before settling back into his combat stance.

Keith winces; he knows what Lance looks like when he's angry, and Lance is honestly _livid_ right now in a way that Keith isn't sure he's ever seen.

It's a little disorientating.

Lance goes on with his training sequence for another ten minutes, during which Keith has taken up residence on the floor beside the door, watching Lance fight with less grace and fluidity than he remembers, but more than Child had exhibited just the day before. It takes most of those ten minutes for Keith to realize that Lance is stalling, waiting for Keith to leave so that he can escape to his room in peace. The moment Keith makes the connection, he shifts from staring at Lance's training to frowning at Lance as he moves, all the while trying to discern what exactly it is that Lance thinks he's going to accomplish here.

 _I'm not leaving until we talk,_ Keith sends through the bond, knowing that Lance will just ignore him if he speaks. Lance takes the Gladiator's back, wrapping his legs around the machine's neck and throwing it to the ground before glaring up at Keith, rage and a hint of betrayal in his eyes. _I'm not,_ he sends again, shrugging, and this time the irritation flickers like a dying lamp through the bond while Lance disables the Gladiator. He gets to his feet, marching across the room toward Keith and wiping at his face with the sleeves of an equally sweaty shirt. He makes a face at his shirt, and for a second Keith considers making a joke.

Something tells him it isn't the time.

Lance settles down beside him, still breathing heavily from his fight as they both stare out at the deactivated training robot.

 _You said you wanted to talk._ Lance's words are sharp and harsh through the bond. _So talk._

Keith swallows. "Look," he says, taking solace in the sound of his own voice despite the lack of the sound of Lance's, "I know that things didn't go the way we planned this afternoon. What I don't get is why you don't want to fix it." Lance snorts, and Keith can feel him rolling his eyes without even looking at him. "I'm serious, Lance. What's going on?"

Lance turns toward Keith, and Keith mirrors the motion. Lance looks him dead in the eye and--

_Pain slams through his whole body, incapacitating him instantly. Bones fracture, skin breaks, sensation fades in and out from his left leg, and for all that he knows the pain can't have been all he's ever known, he can't seem to remember--_

Keith sucks in a gasping breath, his throat feeling rubbed raw like he'd been screaming. He probably had, he realized, if the grim look on Lance's face is any indication. Keith shoves his hands over his eyes, not as surprised as he thinks he should be to feel moisture on his cheeks, and tries to gain some measure of control over his ragged breathing.

Once he's got himself more or less under control, Keith lets his hands fall to his lap. He knows what that was. He knows what Lance was trying to say. And yet, he also knows that he can't accept it. He looks up at Lance, something hot and fierce in his stomach. "So they hurt you. Guess what? They hurt Shiro too." Lance glares at him, but Keith barrels on ahead the way he always has. "Pidge lost their family to them; Allura and Coran lost their whole damn _planet_. And they may not have hurt me or Hunk the same way, but that doesn't mean losing you didn't hurt us too. They've hurt all of us, Lance, and if you can't share that burden with us, then who the hell _can_ you share it with?"

Lance's face darkens and he looks away from Keith, slamming a door shut on the bond in a way that leaves Keith reeling.

"Lance, I--"

Lance just gets to his feet, heading toward the Gladiator as if he's going to start fighting it again.

Keith scrambles to his feet after him, grabbing at his elbow and yanking him around. "Lance, please. Please… let me in."

Lance won't even look at him.

"Please, Lance," he begs, leaning up to kiss Lance's temple, shaking with desperation. "Please, just… tell me what you need."

The bond is silent, and somehow that scares Keith more than Lance's yelling ever did. He shrugs Keith off and starts the Gladiator again with a quiet sort of finality that leaves no room for argument. At a loss, and feeling broken and defeated, Keith slips off the training deck. If Lance won't meet him halfway, there's nothing else he can do.

\----

The next morning, Lance pulls Shiro aside after breakfast, makes a few gestures, and nods vigorously at whatever Shiro ends up saying in response. Shiro asks a few more hushed questions, and Lance just gestures back at him in response. Finally, Shiro nods once before turning around and coming back to the team at large.

"Lance thinks we should try a few battle sims on the training deck this morning to get back in sync and then, if all goes well, we can try forming Voltron again this afternoon. Are we all game for that?"

Keith clenches his jaw, holding his tongue as he waits to hear what the rest of the team thinks.

Pidge and Hunk both look a little skeptical, but Pidge shrugs as they adjust their glasses. "I'm game if Lance is."

Hunk looks from Pidge to Lance to Shiro and back again. "I mean. I don't know if it's going to work, but I'm up for trying again." He gives Lance a lopsided smile. "Whatever it takes, right?"

Keith forces down the anger and irritation and the team’s easy acquiescence, trying to see things the way they all apparently do. The whole reason they all fought so hard to get Lance back was to be able to take down Zarkon, which they can only truly do if they’re able to form Voltron again. So Keith grits his teeth, looks up at Shiro, and nods. "If you think it's best."

He doesn't look at Lance. He can't.

\----

Keith splits off from the team on the way up to the training deck in order to grab Lance's bayard from his room. As he holds it in his hand, he allows himself a brief moment to shift the bayard into the sword that served him so faithfully for those last six months without Lance. The weight is heavy and familiar in his hand, and though he knows it longs to be back in Lance's hand, he can feel it resonate with him one last time. Then he shifts it back to its dormant form and steps out into the hall, jogging up to the training deck. He holds Lance's bayard out to him, and Lance takes it, turning it from side to side in his hand. He nods as though satisfied and leads the way to the center of the training deck. Shiro glances at the rest of the team, shrugs, and follows Lance. The rest of the team follows suit, and they form a tight circle, backs to the center of the room and bayards held at the ready. Keith allows himself a brief moment to take solace in Lance's warmth to his left before he lets his sword and shield loose and settles into a battle stance.

"Alright, team," Coran calls through the speakers. "We'll start at Level One, just to get you warmed up."

It ends up being a damn blessing that Coran started them on the lowest level with the way the whole team's jaw drops watching Lance. In the space of a breath, his bayard switches from the blaster they're all accustomed to into a mace that he swings in a wide arc in front of him, taking out three of the droids in one go. He ducks down between Pidge and Hunk where they stand behind him, taking out the last two droids just as effortlessly. While Pidge and Hunk gape and Keith and Shiro stare, Lance ducks back into position, returning his bayard to its blaster form and taking his place between Keith and Shiro.

"…Alrighty, then," Coran says, sounding a little shaky. "Level Two it is."

Keith hears Lance snort beside him, but he doesn't have time to process before the droids are surrounding them, and, again, Lance is taking them out almost singlehandedly. Shiro and Hunk each take one out, but the other four go down to Lance's blaster. Coran kicks them up to Level Four, and this time the whole team is needed to take the droids out, but Lance seems to have developed a deadly precision with his bayard that takes all of them by surprise. As it continually shifts forms in his hand, Keith can't shake the gnawing sense of nervousness in his stomach. He hasn't seen anything like this since the last time they faced Zarkon in the flesh almost three years ago, and to see Lance move so fluidly after so long without his bayard leaves a cold pit in Keith's stomach. It drives him to distraction, and, three levels later, he's the first to fall prey to the droid's weaponry. The familiar zap doesn't hurt, but the slight tug through the otherwise silent bond throws him for a loop as he drops into the chamber below. He gets slowly to his feet, cracking his back as he does, before sauntering over to the wall to wait for the rest of the team.

It's a good seven or eight minutes before Hunk joins him. Pidge follows another three minutes later, but Shiro and Lance seem to be holding their own up there somehow. When Shiro finally does fall, joining them in the chamber below, he's slow to get to his feet. There's something concerning on his face, but Keith can't quite make himself ask what's wrong.

Shiro joins them them at the door, waiting for Lance to join them. Except they keep waiting. And waiting. And _waiting_. Keith can feel the nerves starting up in his stomach as they wait. None of them has ever lasted more than twenty or thirty seconds alone against the droids, but it's easily been a minute and a half with no sign of the ceiling opening up to produce the wayward blue paladin. Keith's been biting his tongue hard enough that he's surprised he hasn't drawn blood yet, fear and worry numbing the pain.

"Don't worry, Keith," Shiro says gently. "If he's still up there, that means he's doing fine."

"I know," Keith says, trying not to sound too fatalistic. "That's what's got me worried."

Shiro cocks an eyebrow just as the ceiling opens up, dropping Lance to the floor. He lands neatly, dropping into a crouch like a cat, before getting to his feet and brushing nonexistent dust off his armor. He nods once at Shiro, who blinks. "You sure?" Lance nods again. "Alright, then," Shiro says, turning to the group at large. "Let's give Voltron another try."

\----

Keith doesn't even bother trying to argue with Shiro and Lance. If they feel ready, who is he to disagree?

He settles easily into Red's cockpit, trying to calm his nerves. Red rumbles questioningly around him, but Keith just shakes his head. "Nothing to worry about, Red," he says, and he hopes that saying the words makes it so. This time, as Shiro calls them into formation, everything goes a good deal more smoothly. They sync up and this time when their minds brush, everything seems to go according to plan. Neither Lance nor Shiro react negatively, and Keith can feel the way Shiro, Pidge, and Hunk relax into the sync. In fact, Keith thinks he'd be drawn into the sense of familiarity and calm himself if it weren't for the tiny thread of nervousness he can feel through the bond with Lance. He's not sure how he can tell that Lance is only just holding himself together, but he can, and it leaves Keith feeling a bit off-kilter as well. And though he hides it well enough from the rest of the team, he doesn't bother trying to hide it from Lance. After all, they're bonded. Knowing each other's fears and worries is part and parcel of the bond.

Or at least, that's what Keith has been expecting.

It's three days before he finds out that Lance doesn't have the same expectation.

\----

Keith's taken to following the pull of the bond any time he loses track of Lance for more than an hour or two, and today is no exception. While it usually leads him to the training deck and the anxiety that comes from watching Lance fighting with his ever-changing bayard, today it leads him back down to the living quarters. That doesn't concern Keith until he finds the pull from the bond giving an insistent tug toward Zheerun and Karala's room instead of Lance's. Lance has made no secret of how uncomfortable the two make him, and they've been giving him a wide berth in response, so for him to have sought them out makes Keith more than a little nervous.

He makes his way down the hall and knocks lightly on their door. The soft sounds of conversation in the room go instantly silent, and it's a few moments longer than Keith thinks it should be before the door slides open. Karala holds herself carefully between Keith and the room, and her height makes it impossible for Keith to see around her.

Keith nods. "Karala."

Karala nods back. "Keith. Did you need something?"

“I was just looking for Lance,” he says with a frown, trying not to sound cautious.

“Ah.” Karala nods. “Did you need help?”

“No. What I need is for you to let me in so I can talk to my bondmate.”

“I’m sure I don’t--” Karala stops short as Lance comes into view behind her, placing a hand on her shoulder. She blinks, then shrugs and steps aside so Lance can join Keith in the hall, closing the door behind herself to give them some privacy.

Lance nods once at Keith before lounging back against the wall, arms crossed over his chest. Keith takes the stance for the barrier it is and tries not to let it get to him. “Everything okay, Lance?” Lance shrugs, his expression coolly detached in a way Keith hasn’t seen since long before the first time Lance kissed him. It unsettles Keith, but he forges ahead nonetheless. “Look, you know I worry when you disappear for so long, are you sure--”

Lance waves a hand like he’s brushing off Keith’s concerns, and it grates on Keith’s nerves. “Are you serious right now? You know what we did to get you back, so just… just let us know you’re okay once in awhile, alright?”

Lance raises an eyebrow and pushes himself up off the wall, as if to ask if that was all Keith wanted to say.

“Are you-- what the hell, man? I’m just trying to make sure you’re okay and you’re here trying to run off like you’ve got a damn appointment to keep! What the hell? Are you guys working on something, because I thought--” From the way Lance tenses slightly at the accusation, Keith realizes he’s caught onto something Lance probably didn’t want him to. “You are, aren’t you. You and Karala are working on something.” Lance rolls his eyes like he’s trying to brush it off, but there’s just enough nervousness in his stance that Keith knows he just has to push a little harder to figure it out. “No, not Karala. Zheerun.”

Lance looks away, and for an instant Keith considers backing off. But if they’re partners now, the way he always wanted them to be, then honesty and openness are going to make this a whole hell of a lot easier.

“You’re working on something with Zheerun,” Keith presses. “What, are you trying to find a new bondmate?” he asks, hoping the joke will get him some sort of insight, but Lance actually flinches that time, as though Keith’s struck him. For a second, Keith feels like someone’s just dumped a bucket of ice water over his head. “Wait… seriously? You’re… you’re trying to break the bond?”

Lance squeezes his eyes shut, shaking his head minutely, but Keith can feel the tiny sliver of honesty slipping through the bond, and that’s when he realizes. “She’s been _training you_?” he asks, breathless and aching. “To _keep me out_?”

Lance’s throat works, and for a second Keith thinks he’s pushed Lance far enough to say something, but instead he just takes a deep breath, turns to face Keith, and stares him down, a challenge in his gaze.

Keith almost tries to put his fist through the wall next to Lance’s head, and only knowing that Allura won’t let Coran come near him with anything to try to heal his inevitable bruised knuckles keeps him from doing it. So instead, he lets his rage lodge itself in his chest and whispers a quiet, defiant, “Fuck you,” before turning on his heel and walking away.

If Lance doesn’t want to be partners, that’s fine by Keith. He’s been on his own for two years at this point, he can certainly do it again.

The rings seem to weigh a little heavier against his chest when he goes to sleep that night, but Keith just closes his eyes, ignoring the pressure. He’s been strong for this long, he can go on being strong for as long as it takes.

\----

The next day, they can't form Voltron at all.

\----

When they get back from a solid thirty minutes of unsuccessful attempts at forming Voltron, Keith almost doesn’t want to leave his lion. Shiro’s going to be _pissed_ , and that’s honestly the last thing Keith wants to deal with right now. Red rumbles around him, chiding, and Keith sighs in response, forcing himself to his feet and out of the cockpit.

As expected, Shiro is standing in the hangar, arms crossed and a glare on his face that he quickly shifts from a hunch-shouldered Lance over to Keith.

“And you!” Shiro snaps at Keith. “You’re supposed to be better than this! You know what we’re facing, you know what the stakes are, and you’re letting interpersonal issues get in the way of our mission!” Shiro turns back to Lance. “I know you’re having a hard time, Lance, but I also know you well enough to know that that’s not what’s going on. Whatever Keith’s done, tell him what it is, let him make it right, and move on. We don’t have time for squabbling.”

Keith almost takes offense at the accusation, but he also knows he overstepped his bounds with Lance’s training with Zheerun. He doesn’t exactly understand why Lance is still so mad, but Shiro’s right, Keith needs to apologize if they’re ever going to fix this.

So, reluctantly, he turns to Lance and extends an olive branch. “Look, I’m sorry I got in your face about Zheerun. It’s your bond too, and I want you to feel safe. Whatever you need to do is fine with me.”

Lance tenses, looking irritated and uncomfortable, but he doesn’t say anything, either out loud or through the still-silent bond. It grates on Keith’s nerves, but he does his best not to let it show for as long as he can.

When he’s out of patience, he huffs out a tired sigh and asks what he really wants to ask. “Are we gonna talk about this or not?”

Lance snorts, stepping past Keith and throwing one last glare over his shoulder as he marches out of the hangar.

\----

Things don’t get better. Lance goes on avoiding Keith as best he can, and Keith can’t decide if he wants to let Lance do what he needs to do and hope he comes around, or nag him until he sees things Keith’s way. This means he ends up doing a little of both depending on what mood he’s in, nagging Lance one day and avoiding him the next. The whole team is on edge, and while Keith is pretty sure the rest of them have figured out what Lance is doing, he’s equally sure that none of them are going to intervene. Hunk’s the only one that even comes close to understanding what a bond is and what it feels like, and he’s spent the entirety of the time since Lance came back supporting Lance in any way he can. Keith doesn’t blame him--they’ve been best friends for longer than Keith has known either of them--but it does suck that he doesn’t really have a sympathetic ear to talk to about the hollow ache in his chest where Child used to be. Pidge is great for an analysis of what’s going on, but not the best person to talk to about feelings; Allura and Shiro are trying not to take sides; and while Coran might be helpful, Keith isn’t sure he has the patience to deal with his tangents right now.

So instead, he seethes, irritated and on edge, waiting for the dam to break. Keith knows he’s let this fester for way too long, but he knowing that Lance has been working with Zheerun off and on--despite their confrontation and despite Shiro’s warnings that they need to sort their shit out--leaves Keith reluctant to offer another olive branch. The worst part is that Lance seems to be having a decent amount of success with closing the bond off, altogether too obvious in the way Keith feels less and less bleeding through the bond between them as the days go on, leaving him almost completely in the dark as to what Lance is thinking and feeling. Not to mention that apparently something in the last two years has taught Lance how to keep his emotions off his face. As someone that used to be able to read Lance like an open book, the complete impassivity is making Keith even more irritable than his fight with Lance would without the mitigating factors.

So when the alarm blares, sending them off on another mission, Keith sees an opportunity to make Lance crack, and he takes it.

“No need to join us, Lance,” Keith sneers, “We’ve been handling shit like this without you for two years, and we still can’t form Voltron. You’d get in the way.”

Lance’s eyes flash for an instant before his cool façade returns. He rolls his eyes and starts to saunter over to the chute that will take him to his lion anyway when Shiro interrupts. “He has a point, Lance.”

Lance turns around, staring at Shiro with a challenge in his eyes.

Shiro shakes his head. “We know how to handle these situations just the four of us. I can’t speak for everyone, but I know I’m going to be looking over my shoulder for you the whole time if you come along.”

Lance makes a few sharp gestures that make it clear what he thinks of that, but Shiro just shakes his head again. “I’m sorry, Lance, but I won’t budge on this. Allura can bring the castle through the wormhole so that you and Keith aren’t too far apart while he’s down on the surface and you’re up here, and if something goes wrong, you can come join us, but until then I’d rather you stay in the castle.”

Lance crosses his arms and looks away, his face smoothing quickly from the brief moment of indignance to a cool sort of disinterest.

Satisfied that Lance will stay put, Shiro turns to the rest of the paladins. “Alright, Team, let’s get going.”

Leaving Lance behind doesn’t hurt as much as Keith thinks it should.

\----

It’s as Keith drags his badly damaged lion to her feet, almost half an hour into a slowly worsening battle, that he finds himself realizing that keeping Lance out of this fight may not have been the best idea. The Galra came much better prepared than the patrols they’re used to engaging, and Keith wouldn’t be surprised to learn that this was an ambush planned specifically to draw them out like this. The other three paladins seem to be faring alright, but Keith had been the first through the wormhole and had taken two pretty solid shots before Pidge got him to a better vantage point. He’s pretty sure he has whiplash and possibly a broken collarbone, and, if the three different warning lights on her control panel are any indication, Red’s doing even worse.

“Come on, girl,” he murmurs, feeling her trill determinedly around him. “Hang on. Just hang on for me.” She rumbles back and gets to her feet, a little unsteady, but standing.

That lasts about fifteen seconds and one blast of fire from her jaw. As soon as the fire dissipates, one of the Galra speeders dive bombs him, slamming Red to the ground and stunning Keith for a few moments.

As he blinks back stars, he hears Shiro and Pidge shouting his name while Hunk grunts, presumably now standing between Keith and the offending Galra speeder. Keith opens his mouth to try and say something, but as he moves, he tastes blood in the back of his throat and ends up gagging as he fights down the urge to vomit. He hears himself make a pained sound, except it comes as though through a comm, followed by a brief second in which he feels pure rage fill him. It takes him by surprise, but serves to let him shake off the pain long enough to get Red back on her feet. There’s a ringing in his ears that leaves him a little nauseated for a moment, but as he gets his bearings he realizes the ringing wasn’t just in his ears.

It was in his chest too.

Gasping for breath through the pain and realization, Keith turns Red to look up to the sky, and there, just above them, he sees Blue come exploding through the dust clouds like an avenging angel, opening her mouth and coating five Galra speeders in ice. Then Blue turns to face Black, and Keith knows what Lance is saying, speaks the words without even meaning to.

“Shiro!” Keith calls out. “Now!”

There’s only a brief moment of shocked silence before Shiro speaks, casting aside any doubt. “Alright, Team! Let’s go!”

Forming Voltron isn’t easy, not by a long shot, and Keith can feel where Lance and Shiro are hanging on by the skin of their teeth, where he himself isn’t fitting perfectly into the sync with the team. But they all want the same thing, they all want to take these Galra down, and, for now, that seems to be enough. For now, that’s going to get them out alive.

\----

With the Galra defeated and the planet’s inhabitants duly liberated, the team makes their way back to the castle. Keith’s the last out of his lion, moving a little gingerly through the pain, which is why Shiro’s shout is the only warning he gets before Lance comes to a stop in front of him and shoves him sharply in the chest.

Keith staggers backward, at once taken aback and a little grateful, because this is the Lance that he knows. The one that holds nothing back when it comes to the people he loves, that needles them and goads them and pokes at the aches and the sores and the cuts until they break open and the pain comes out. Keith takes stock of himself, of what his body is and isn’t capable of, and then he straightens, looking Lance in the eye.

“You seriously wanna go right now?” he asks, snark lacing his tone.

Lance just shoves him again.

“Alright,” Keith concedes, tugging his helmet off and tossing it aside, “then let’s fucking go.”

It’s nothing like that last training session with Child, rhythmic and easy and simple. No, Lance has none of Child’s restraint. He wastes no time, snarling sharply and leveling a kick with his artificial leg straight at Keith’s ribs, which knocks the wind out of Keith. Keith takes barely a second to catch his breath again before he’s darting in close, throwing punches that Lance catches almost effortlessly. But even as Lance fights, there’s a panic and a tension in what little is still left open in the bond between them, a desperation that belies the ease and grace of his movements. It’s a fascinating dichotomy, and one that almost makes Keith fail to block Lance’s right hook. He manages it at the last second, though, and parries easily. A whipcrack of anxiety lances through Keith’s chest, and it stuns him for a split second, but as soon as he recovers, he finds himself retaliating in the strangest way.

“Is that really the best you’ve got?” he asks, a sneer on his face. “The Lance I remember--”

Lance’s face twists and he doesn’t even let Keith finish, ducking down to sweep Keith’s legs out from under him and then landing hard in a straddle on Keith’s chest, taking control of the fight. The fist fight turns quickly into grappling, hands wrapped around vulnerable joints and fists curled in what little leverage they can get on the paladin armor. Keith’s pretty sure he hears Shiro yelling at them to knock it off, but if Shiro really wants them to quit, he can damn well break them up himself. This is between him and Lance, and if this is the only way they’re going to be able to settle the days of simmering tension, then so be it.

Keith manages to [shrimp out](https://youtu.be/4J75b9zFdgM?t=2m42s) from under Lance and get him into [a guard](http://www.phase3.biz/core/uploads/JJP/photos/Cross%20Choke%20D.jpg), slowly taking some modicum of control back. It only seems to serve to piss Lance off even more, making him sloppy, leaving him vulnerable and letting Keith [sweep his legs out from under him](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qhA_Ivwp4Tc), putting him astride Lance’s chest. Lance’s face goes red, and he starts writhing underneath Keith, trying to [bridge up and force him off](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rok32K89DZc), but Keith keeps a decent balance under him, keeping Lance pinned. Keith resists the urge to goad Lance again, instead ducking in tight and [wrapping an arm around Lance’s neck to start a choke](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2d4vWuDfG-M). Lance immediately tries to counter the motion, but Keith is ready, using Lance’s own arm as leverage into a tighter choke hold.

Without warning, Lance goes limp underneath Keith. That may have been the goal of the choke hold, but the suddenness of the reaction takes Keith by surprise. He opens his mouth to ask if something’s wrong, only to be stopped short by a shock of cold, cloying, choking fear echoing down the bond. Keith releases the choke hold and sits up immediately, willing to risk falling into a trap if it means making sure Lance is okay.

For a split second, after he’s drawn back, an achingly familiar pressure starts up behind his sternum, and he feels the yank of being pulled into a mind walk. Yet it stops halfway, not submerging him completely, and he finds himself staring up at his own face from Lance’s position on the floor. The bond is humming with power and energy and Keith doesn’t have time to register much more than the certainty that this isn’t what Lance meant to happen. As he stares up at himself, in the split second before his mind snaps back to his own body, he feels what Lance felt, sees what Lance saw.

Druid features, twisted and malicious, superimposed over Keith’s face.

Utterly shaken, Keith isn’t at all surprised when Lance bridges his hips up, throwing Keith off and ending the fight in an instant. Keith lets himself lie beside Lance, dazed, a little confused, and utterly, utterly ashamed. He can hear the choked off whimpers from beside him, and aches to reach out for Lance, but if that’s what Lance sees when he looks at him--

Well. It’s no wonder Lance has been trying to hide in his own mind.

Someone moves toward them, and Keith chances a quick glance to the side, assuring himself that it is indeed Hunk that is moving to ease Lance to his feet and help him out of the hangar. For his part, Keith just goes on lying on his back, face turned to the ceiling while he tries to process what just happened.

Pidge squats down beside him, poking him once in the side as though to make sure he’s still in one piece. Keith grunts in response. “So,” Pidge says conversationally. “That went well.”

Keith puts his hands over his eyes and starts laughing a little hysterically. He honestly doesn’t know how that could have gone any _worse_ , and it’s oddly reassuring to know that everyone else knows just how badly he fucked up. Keith laughs and laughs, trying and failing to catch his breath, because if there’s one thing he’d wanted to avoid at all costs, it was alienating Lance further, and that seems to be exactly what he’s just done.

Awesome. _Awesome_.

\----

An hour later finds Keith in his room still nursing all the aches and pains of battle, unwilling to let a healing pod soothe them away. This is his cross to bear, his burden to carry, and it’s so small, so insignificant in comparison to what Lance is carrying that he can’t find it in himself to welcome the potential reprieve. Coran’s the one that finds him there, medkit in hand. He gestures at the bed beside Keith, who moves aside with a wince that obviously doesn’t go unnoticed by Coran.

Coran pops open the medkit, rifling through it briefly, waving at Keith to slip his shirt off so he can have a look. “You gave us quite a scare back there,” he says after a moment. Keith grunts and tosses his shirt aside, but doesn’t say anything. “ _All_ of us, Keith. Lance too. He might have been even more frightened than Allura and I were.”

Keith actually laughs at that. “Right. That’s why he wanted to punch my face in the second we made it back to base.”

“Fear is a complicated emotion, Keith,” Coran cautions. “It doesn’t always show itself the same way every time.” Keith doesn’t say anything, and Coran sighs, taping up lacerations and rubbing ointment on bruises. He offers Keith a pill for the concussion he apparently has, and then sits back. “Anywhere else giving you a lot of pain?”

Keith gestures vaguely at his collarbone. “I think it might be broken,” he adds dully. Coran prods at it, eliciting a wince from Keith.

Coran gives a small smile. “Not broken. Just bruised.” Coran snaps the medkit shut and gets to his feet, a knowing look on his face. “Maybe you should start looking at Lance like that instead of like china with too many cracks to count.”

Keith doesn’t reply, choosing instead to sit and stare down at his hands. He doesn’t look at Lance like he’s broken.

Does he?

\----

Keith finds himself toying with his food more than normal at dinner that night. The same tension of the last few days is still thick in the room, maybe even worse after his little altercation with Lance this afternoon.

Little. _Hah_. It was anything but.

Shiro and Allura are trying desperately to keep some semblance of conversation going while Hunk keeps casting concerned glances between Keith and Lance. Pidge is clearly holding back snark as best they can, and Keith can’t decide if he’s appreciative of their restraint, or if some part of him desperately wants them to break the tension, if only so that Keith can meet Lance’s eyes across the table and--

And what? Lance wants nothing to do with him right now; why should Keith want anything different? The thought sets a vice around his chest, one that he’s all too familiar with, but from the way Lance flinches and reaches for his chest, Keith knows he’s projecting that feeling much too hard.

He pushes his chair back. “I’m gonna head to bed,” he says, voice pinched. “See you guys later.”

As he leaves, he doesn’t turn to see if Lance watches him go. He’s not sure he wants to know.

\----

Everything comes to a head the next day when they’re fifteen minutes into a training sim. Lance hasn’t so much as looked at Keith all morning, and Keith hasn’t tried to force him to. He knows he screwed up yesterday, and if Lance needs time, Keith is perfectly willing to wait.

But apparently what Lance needed wasn’t time. Apparently what Lance needed was a reason.

Keith isn't sure at first what set Lance off, but he sees Lance’s gaze ghost over him in the middle of the sim, only for his eyes to flick back over to Keith. For a second, Keith thinks Lance is just going to glare at him and then go back to fighting. Instead, Lance’s face goes pale and stunned, his features slack. In the space of an instant, Lance stops being the precise but deadly version of himself that they've slowly become accustomed to, and instead he becomes what can only be described as a demon. With a scream that makes everyone jump, Lance shifts his bayard, and Keith has a split second view of something small in the palm of his hand before Lance drops to the ground, slamming his palm to the floor.

The small shockwave that resonates from the point of contact leaves a strange buzzing in Keith's ears and a tingling in his left leg, but he barely notices that in the face of the way Shiro grunts, his right arm going limp at his side. Keith glances over at Shiro, distracted from the robots momentarily, but Shiro is staring at Lance, wide-eyed and stunned. Keith follows his gaze to see Lance dragging himself to his feet while his left leg drags behind him, useless from what Keith is quickly realizing was an EMP blast. Lance shakes the bayard in his hand and it shifts into a sword that is remarkably similar to Keith's, and then Lance is slicing the dozens of nonfunctional robots into pieces, an unholy rage driving him despite his now mostly-useless leg.

"Lance!" Keith calls, moving toward him a little cautiously. "Lance, take it easy! It's over, it's done, the droids are--"

"¡Cierra el pinche hocico!" Lance snaps, turning to Keith with a fury in his eyes that, when combined with the fact that Lance is _actually speaking_ stops Keith dead in his tracks. " Cierra el pinche hocico y no _quieras_ pretender que esto no es tu culpa. "

Keith blinks, the bond making Lance's ire clear, but not his meaning. "Lance, I--"

"Chingada[1], shut your fucking mouth, Keith, tú no sabes-- tú no sabes--"

"Lance, calm down," Hunk interrupts, sounding a little scared, "Keith wasn't--"

Lance rounds on Hunk. " _Don't_ you talk to me, Hunk,  pendejo[2]! You don't know what this pinche imbécil[2] did so don't you _fucking_ tell me what he was or wasn't doing!"

Hunk blinks, taking a step backward. Lance just turns and storms toward Keith, who's so taken aback he can't even make himself move. Lance marches right up to him, his leg still dragging behind him, and laces his fingers through the chain at Keith's neck, tugging him forward.

"¿Que chingados es esto?” he hisses.

Keith blinks. "What?"

Lance tugs on the chain again, dragging Keith close enough that, for a wild moment, Keith thinks he's going to go for a kiss. "What the fuck is this?" he asks, and Keith feels his blood go cold.

"I… I thought they were…." Keith swallows, looking away for a second. Lance tugs on the chain sharply, and Keith looks back at him on instinct alone, anger giving his words a harsh edge. "Well, what do you want me to say? That I assumed they were for us? That I asked Hunk to make sure and then took them because they made me feel close to you when you were out of reach? That they were the only thing that kept me going when you were being _tortured_? When I didn’t even know if you were _alive_? God, Lance, what do you want me to say?"

"That you didn't spend two years waiting for me thinking things were going to be the same!" Lance shouts, tugging the chain hard enough that for a second Keith thinks it might break as Lance hauls him up onto the balls of his feet by his neck. “That you weren’t so blinded by what you thought was going to happen when you got me back that you wasted two years waiting for me when you could have been looking for someone else to pilot the Blue Lion! That you’re not so much of a _fucking_ idiot that you wasted two years for nothing!”

“Nothing?” Keith snaps back, shoving Lance forward and following him when he doesn’t release his grip on the chain around Keith’s neck. “Nothing? That’s all I was to you? That’s all _we_ were to you? _Nothing_?”

Lance’s face goes angry again. “Pinche pedazo de mierda ni sabe que-- That’s not what I meant and you know it!”

“No, Lance, I don’t know that! You’ve had me locked out for three days, you wouldn’t talk to me, you didn’t tell me anything about what was going on in that thick skull of yours, so you know what? No, Lance, I don’t know that’s not what you meant, so why don’t you get off your goddamn high horse and _tell me_ what you meant?”

Lance releases his grip on the chain around Keith’s neck and steps back, turning away and clenching his fingers in his hair. "You had everything! You were safe and Blue was safe and everyone else was safe and you were _fine_!” he shouts, and Keith thinks that in another life he might be amused at what Lance’s hair looks like when he yanks his fingers from it. “You were fine and you would have gone on being fine, but you had to come storming in, guns blazing, and risk all of that for something worthless and broken! For _nothing_!!"

“And what exactly do you think we were risking everything for? Voltron? Because yeah, I know the fusion’s kind of a joke right now, but if you think Voltron is nothing--”

“You think I give a fuck about Voltron right now?” Lance asks, voice edging into hysteria. “Voltron is about the least worthless thing on this fucking ship is right now.”

“Then what the fuck do you think we all risked our necks for that’s so worthless?”

“Haven’t you been listening, idiota? You risked everything for me! And all I’ve done since I’ve gotten back is drag you all down and hold you all back and if you all had just _left me_ on that _stupid_ cruiser and found someone else to pilot Blue, then maybe you wouldn’t be in this fucking mess in the first place!”

The room goes completely silent. No one moves, and Keith’s pretty sure no one is daring to breathe either. Keith can’t seem to make himself stop staring at Lance, shocked into silence, because for Lance--strong, arrogant, _reckless_ Lance--to say something like that--

It's Shiro that comes out of their collective stupor first, still cradling his useless arm. “Lance, is that… is that really what you think?”

Lance wraps his arms around himself, as though he's trying to make himself small.

Shiro takes half a step toward Lance, his lips parted as though to say something soothing, but Keith's already in motion, stepping up to Lance and fisting his hands in the collar of his jacket.

“No.” Keith’s voice is dangerously low and razor sharp. “I know you feel like that right now, but you’re wrong.”

“Tú no sabes nada-- you don’t know _anything_ , Keith, shut your damn--”

“I do,” Keith interrupts, tugging Lance down so that their foreheads are pressed together. “You may think you’ve got the bond locked down tight, but you don’t, okay? You don’t. I can still feel you on the edges, so I know you think that’s true, but it’s not. It’s not true. You’re _anything_ but worthless.” Lance claws at Keith’s hands, and Keith can tell he’s irritated, but not yet agitated, so he tightens his grip and forges on ahead. “I don’t know what the Galra did to you while they had you, but I know they hurt you. I know that much. I know that you think they took you and broke you, and maybe that part is true. But I don’t think they broke you, and I know for a _fact_ that you’re not worthless.”

“No empiezes conmigo, Keith, tú no _sabes_ \--”

“You’re not,” Keith whispers, and somehow it’s that that cuts Lance off. “You’re not worthless. Allura told us, after we lost you. Shiro asked her because we all felt off and wrongfooted all the time. So he asked her what makes the Blue Lion choose her paladin. And do you know what she said?” From so close, Keith can’t quite make out Lance’s eyes, but he can feel the way Lance’s attention is zeroed in on him through the bond. “Honesty. Openness. Warmth. _Hope_. Everything that this team needs to stay on course. And it was gone, Lance. For two years.

“And then the second we got you back, the second I saw you on that cruiser, I knew that we were going to be okay. That the team was going to be okay. Because as long as we had you back, we could learn to hope again. You’re our base, Lance. You and Hunk, you keep us standing tall. That’s all we could ever ask of you, and you’re doing it already. So don’t you dare call yourself useless again, because you’re anything but.”

Lance is shaking, but Keith forges ahead regardless. “And yes, I’m wearing your rings. I’m wearing them because they kept me going, Lance. They kept me strong. For you. Because everything I’ve done for the last two years has been for you, and everything that I’m going to do for as long as you’ll let me will be for you. Not for what’s been done to you or what you’ve experienced or what you can do, but for you. For _you_.”

Lance shakes his head, his fingers coming up to cradle the back of Keith’s head. “I don’t know if I’m that person anymore, Keith. I don’t know if that person exists anymore.”

“We don’t need who you used to be, Lance,” Keith says, voice low and certain. “We need you. We just need you.” Then, desperation making him brave, Keith closes his eyes and whispers, “ _I_ need you.”

Lance lets out a wounded sound, but doesn’t give. “Keith…” he whispers, “the things they did to me. The things I saw. You don’t want to see them.”

“I don’t _need_ to see them,” Keith corrects. “I don’t need to see them, Lance, but if you want to show them to me, I will take them on. My purpose now is to help you feel good again, whatever good means to you. Whether it’s feeling strong or capable or independent, whatever it is that will make you feel good again, that’s what I want. Okay? That’s what I want.”

Lance makes the same wounded sound and draws back only to dive back in, burying his face in Keith’s neck, fingers slipping down to grasp at Keith’s collar. Keith slides his own hands up to cup the back of Lance’s head, holding him close. “I’m scared, Keith,” he whispers. “I’m scared of my own mind. How am I ever supposed to let you in if I’m scared of my own mind? How am I supposed to do _anything_ when I’m scared of my own mind?”

“The same way we’ve done everything so far: as a team. Because that’s what we are, Lance. A team. Have been for years. That doesn’t change unless you want it to.”

Lance tightens his hands in Keith’s collar. “You sure about that? I’m pretty fucked up.”

“I’m sure,” Keith says, turning his head to press a kiss to Lance’s hair. “You’re still you--that’s all that matters to me.”

Lance nods. “Okay. Okay.”

The word echoes in Keith’s chest, and for a second he thinks he feels Child reaching out to both of them through it. It resettles something in Keith that he didn’t know had moved and leaves him feeling braver than he’s felt in ages. He has Lance at his side, and even if they never fit the way they used to, they're communicating again, which is what matters most. That's what always saved them before, and it's what will save them again. Keith reaches up, covering Lance's hands with his own and closing his eyes. They're going to be okay.

\----

Lance cautiously follows Keith to his room after dinner that night, hovering in the doorway until Keith holds out a silent hand to him. Lance moves slowly, clearly still uncertain, but he steps into the room and crosses over to Keith, taking his hand. Keith draws Lance’s hand to his lips, kissing the tips of his fingers one at a time.

“They broke them, you know,” Lance says softly. Keith hums, turning Lance’s hand so he can kiss his palm. “After they gave me my leg. They broke my fingers.”

Keith looks up at him. “Okay,” he says gently.

Lance’s eyes flicker. “That’s it? ‘Okay’?”

Keith blinks. “Do you want me to ask?”

Lance shrugs. “I don’t--” he starts, but then he huffs out a breath and shakes his head. “Yeah, I guess so.”

Keith nods. “Did they break them all at the same time?”

“Not at first. At first it was just two or three, but eventually they’d break my whole hand just to see if they could put it back together.”

Keith takes a slow, deep breath and lets it out just as slowly in an effort to stay calm. The anger is familiar--he’s felt it since they got Lance back--but Lance is trying to share something with Keith, something separate from the anger, and Keith needs to honor that. “That must have hurt.”

Lance closes his eyes, taking his own shuddery breath. “Yeah,” he says softly. “Yeah, it did.”

They stay like that for a long time, just watching each other. Then Keith tugs gently on Lance’s hand, just enough to get his attention. “You wanna stay the night?”

Lance’s face goes soft and affectionate. “You don’t mind?”

“Not at all. I’ve… I’ve missed being close to you.”

Lance smiles. “Lemme just--” He jerks a thumb toward the door, and Keith nods.

“You can if you want to, but your robe is on the hook and some of your pajamas are still in your drawer.”

“Yeah?” Lance asks, sounding startled.

“Yeah. No pressure, but….” Keith shrugs. “They’re there.”

Lance nods slowly, getting to his feet and rummaging in his drawer. He glances over at Keith a little awkwardly.“Do you mind…?” He gestures for Keith to turn around, and Keith obliges without a word, turning to face the wall. Even so, it takes clenched shut eyes and silently counting backward from a thousand to keep from turning around to look at Lance. He misses that easy confidence, even though he understands why it’s been shaken. The bed dips, and Keith feels Lance’s chin on his shoulder, Lance’s arms around his waist, Lance’s mouth on his throat.

Keith hums softly. “We should probably sleep.”

Lance sighs, drawing back. “Yeah,” he agrees, tugging the top sheet out from underneath them, “we probably should.”

Keith turns around, hopping out of bed just long enough to hit the lights. Then he’s slipping under the top sheet and back into bed, eyes on Lance in the slight illumination from the clock. Tentatively, Keith reaches out, running a hand down Lance’s side and coming to rest at his hip. “Thank you,” he says softly. “For listening today,” he adds when Lance gives him a confused look.

Lance just smiles back. “Thank you for being patient.”

Keith snorts. “I don’t know about _patient_ , but I’m here, and I’m not going anywhere. I promise.”

Lance smiles, leaning in to kiss Keith’s forehead. That night, for the first time in too long, Keith falls asleep knowing that Lance is in his arms, and knowing, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that he’ll be there in the morning.

\----

Forming Voltron the next day is as easy as riding a bicycle. It’s not back to that breathless ease of Before, but it’ll do for now.

As long as they can stand between the Galra Empire and the rest of the universe, everything will work out.

**Author's Note:**

> WELL THAT WAS A BIT OF A WHIRLWIND!! I'm sorry this installment took so long; I'm slowly transitioning back to work, and it's eating up a lot of time that would otherwise be spent writing. I actually considered waiting to post this until I had something done on part 9 because my writing time is going to be so diminished in the coming weeks and months now that I'm back at work, but it felt mean to deprive you guys when I had this part all done. The next installment is going to take a while again, but I hope you'll stick with me! We have at least more part plus an epilogue to go, and then I would _like_ to do some other ficlets as well, but I'm not 100% sure how they fit in the main arc of the series, so I don't know when they'll get written.
> 
>  **Footnotes:**  
>  1The initial plan here was to throw some Spanish in the middle of the sentence, but my Spanish-speaking beta noted that it wouldn't flow very well, so we moved the "fucking" that would have been in Spanish to the beginning of the phrase instead of putting it in the middle. [return to text]
> 
> 2For both of these I just straight up told my beta to come up with something mean for Lance to call Hunk and Keith, and oh MAN am I glad I did. Insults in Spanish are WAY diverse, and way more fun for it. [return to text]
> 
> Other translations:  
> ¡Cierra el pinche hocico! = **You shut your fucking mouth!**  
>  Cierra el pinche hocico y no _quieras_ pretender que esto no es tu culpa. = **You shut your fucking mouth and don’t you _dare_ pretend that this isn’t your fault.**  
>  tú no sabes-- tú no sabes-- = **you don’t know-- you don’t know--**  
>  ¿Que chingados es esto? = **What the fuck is this?**  
>  Pinche pedazo de mierda ni sabe que-- = **Fucking piece of shit doesn’t even know--**  
>  idiota = **idiot**  
>  Tú no sabes nada-- = **You don’t know anything--**  
>  No empiezes conmigo, Keith, tú no _sabes_ \-- = **Don’t you start with me, Keith, you don’t _know_ \--**
> 
> [Come hang with me on tumblr!!](http://hollyandvice.tumblr.com/)


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